


The Ice Around My Heart

by shadowolfhunter



Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: M/M, The Pink Panther has been slinking through my brain again
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-19
Updated: 2017-09-25
Packaged: 2018-11-16 01:51:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11243865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowolfhunter/pseuds/shadowolfhunter
Summary: The Captain arrives home after work to find that his life has just become immeasurably more complicated.There is a beautiful man asleep in his bed, and a dead woman in his bath.Sean sighs and rubs his forehead, it's going to be a long night!





	1. Once More Into the Breach

**Author's Note:**

> Okay. This is it folks. I don't usually go into this sort of thing, but my life is quite complicated at the best of times, I am working on a lot of things, including my own novels, which command a great deal of my attention right now so something has got to give.
> 
> So. Since I don't get much in the way of feedback or comments on my stories, time has come to draw fanfic to a close. I have a few stories I really want to finish. But this will likely be the last of the new ones, unless I actually have a compelling reason to find the time to continue. And by compelling reason I mean comments/feedback of some kind. Even then, it might be slow going, because real life.
> 
> It's been a hell of a ride for the last seventeen years or so.

It had been a long day. He was tired, all he really wanted was a nice hot shower, a nice dinner with some very nice wine, and a nice long sleep in his nice big comfortable bed. Nothing thrilling. Just nice.

Sean deposited his briefcase on his desk, shed his raincoat in the hall closet and mounted the stairs while loosening his tie. As tempting as it was to just drop his clothes on the floor, a lifetime's habit of tidiness had him reaching for the hanger to hang up his suit jacket, and kicking off his shoes to pad across to his bathroom door.

A leg dangled over the side of his bath. And Sean stopped dead. Unfortunate choice of words; she lay in his bath, her head at an angle that told him her neck was broken. There was a bruise, but very few other marks, and then his police training kicked in and he backed away turning towards his bedside table and the extension line.

He hadn't taken two steps before he registered that there was a beautiful man in his bed. Nicholas Burkhardt. And apparently he was naked.

Sean pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. Somehow he knew it was going to be a very long night.


	2. A VERY Long Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hank and Wu think that Sean roofied Nick and killed the woman in the tub. Which doesn't make sense, but then nothing much seems to these days.

Half an hour later, Sean is sitting on his couch, irritably, thinking that just the once he should have gotten rid of the evidence instead of calling it in. Somehow Griffin and Wu have decided he's guilty before they can prove him innocent, so he's nominally in their custody. Hank has cuffed him, Sean sits there in his shirt sleeves, cuffed behind his back in his own living room while people tramp up and down his staircase and Nick broods in his kitchen while Hank and Wu repeatedly ask Nick if he's alright.

The only minor upside to this crisis, is that they haven't formally taken him in, and so far, providing they don't find two and two add up to five, he should get out of this and still keep his job.

He's tired, uncomfortable, and all he really wants to do is woge, snarl at them and throw them out of his house.

He doubts he ever wants to use that bathroom again though.

 

Nick leans up against Sean's kitchen counter and stares at the back of Sean's head. He can see that the zauberbiest is tired, and miserable, and Nick really has no idea why he should care about what Sean Renard is feeling, but he does. Which is strange.

He eyes Hank. "I know that this is strange for me to say, but he's done nothing to me, and I doubt he had anything to do with the woman either."

Hank is reluctant. "Are you sure?" This could be their opportunity to get rid of Sean Renard for good, as he doubts the zauberbiest would be able to wriggle out of a second murder.

Nick nods. "I'm sure." He says quietly, and takes the handcuff keys from Hank.

He walks over to Sean, leaning over the back of the sofa, to reach for the cuffs, unlocking them. For some reason, he gently strokes the back of Sean's left wrist, but the zauberbiest pulls away and stands up, putting space between himself and Nick. Their eyes meet, and Nick realises that this could be a turning point for both of them. 

"Sean." he says.

Sean actually wants to rub his wrists, because they ache a little with being held behind him for twenty minutes or so, but he doesn't want to give Nick the satisfaction. He and the Grimm are enemies, that has been made perfectly plain to him on multiple occasions. "Can I leave?" He says, cold, clipped tone. No hint of forgiveness. He's stuck with the Grimm and his friends, but he doesn't have to like it.

Nick wants to make this better, but he doesn't really know how to, and so he nods. Sean is round the end of the couch and up the stairs before Nick can say any more. He emerges a few minutes later with a briefcase in one hand and a duffle bag in the other. His suit jacket is back on, he heads for the closet where he grabs his trench coat, and is out the door before Nick can stop him.

Nick just stands there in his borrowed sweats and tries to process what happened.

"Well that was odd."

"Huh!" Nick takes his eyes from the front door where Renard vanished and stares at his partner. Hank is holding something out, wrapped in a crime scene bag. Nick takes it, it's a toe tag, wet, crumpled, but still legible. Nick frowns and looks at his partner. "Mrs Marjory Hoffenstahl...?"

Hank glances down at his pad. "Died of natural causes three days ago, I called the morgue and they confirmed it. Marjory Hoffenstahl was taken from their morgue sometime this afternoon." He gave Nick a worried glance, "this time, I think this isn't Wesen."

Nick spreads his hands wide, "it doesn't explain how I went to sleep in my own bed, and woke up in Renard's...NAKED! or why the hell anyone would steal a corpse and stick it in a bath?" Nor why Sean seemed so hurt and jittery. But he wasn't going to say that to Hank. Neither Hank or Wu had really got over the events of Renard's fall and rise and fall, and subsequent rise again. Nick could barely process it himself.

Even after everything that he had been through, and what Renard had put them all through, strangely Nick wants to make it up with him. He wants the senior officer that he had learned to rely on back, even if he had never fully learned to trust the man.


	3. The Curious Incident in the Daytime

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick ponders his relationship with Sean Renard as the Captain continues to be cold and distant, and Nick's emotions still seem to be engaged in trying to win the zauberbiest over.
> 
> Then something happens that changes things for them both.

For the next few days at work, the Captain is colder, harder and more closed off than he has ever been. Everybody can feel it. People keep their heads down and avoid testing him. They have the feeling that they would not come out on top if they do.

Nick actually feels sorry that Sean is distancing himself from everybody. Which seems somewhat strange to him, because when did he start caring about the Captain. He hates Sean Renard, right? Only that no longer feels quite right.

And how the hell did he fall asleep in his own bed, with Adalind, and wake up in Sean's bed, clear across town, NAKED! (He's still freaking out about that part). And why does he keep thinking of the zauberbiest as Sean?

 

Sean hasn't been home since that night, well not to sleep at any rate. He's been back when everyone has gone, collected sufficient clothing, and toiletries, his hidden go bag, with the things he needs if he is going to leave in a hurry. He's been running almost all his life, and right now he doesn't want to think about the last ten years, the home he'd thought he'd found, the hope that had sustained him for most of the last seven years, since Nick came into his life. He definitely does not want to even think about Nick. At all.

The yacht is moored on the Willamette. It's not all that ideal as a home, but right now, he wants a way to pull up stakes if he needs to, and the yacht is mobile, and he's put the ownership into one of his other identities. A Canadian one. The mooring is discrete, and he does as little to draw attention to himself as possible.

 

It doesn't take long for Nick to discover that Sean is not going back to his big, fancy, expensive house. He has no idea where the zauberbiest is sleeping, but it's nowhere nearby and a cursory examination of hotels, shows him that Sean hasn't checked in anywhere. Nick is worried. He tries not to be, he even talks it all over with Monroe, who is silent for a while. Then Monroe looks at him and says "perhaps if we had done more when he was invaded by Jack." Nick nods, because now he's had time to process all the events of the last year or so, it has been bothering him that they never even asked Sean how he was doing after all that.

But Nick still cannot get close to Sean. The zauberbiest won't allow it.

 

There's a raid, it's all hands to the pump, including people being brought in from two other precincts to assist. Despite their careful preparations, it goes down hard. Captain directs operations with military precision, but there is a lot of gunfire. Everyone is tired and breathless as they mop up. Nick hands his two targets off to uniforms and walks towards the Captain, standing there, tall, strong and inscrutable as ever. Sean half turns in his direction, his body jerks; startled Nick looks around to see the cause. Looks back, Sean sways slightly, his jacket and raincoat open, Nick can't see anything but some instinct makes him follow as Sean turns away from him and heads towards the ambulance parked to one side.

He doesn't raise his voice, but Nick is so close behind him at that point that he hears Sean say to the paramedic "I've been shot." He sways again, and this time Nick is lunging forward to grab him before he can fall, and the paramedic's on the other side, and they help Sean into the ambulance.

They help him lie down on the gurney, and as Sean's coat and jacket fall to one side, there's blood on his side. It's quite low, just above his belt, and Nick shifts to the seat at the back of the ambulance. "I'm going with him." He doesn't know why he says this, he's not friends with the Captain, Sean Renard is a grown man, he has never shown any sign that he's needed Nick to hold his hand, but Nick stays anyway.

 

The ride to the hospital is horrible. Sean's breathing is laboured, and Nick can feel the stress pouring off him. It gets worse when the paramedic working on his wound wants to put an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose. Nick has never seen the zauberbiest panic before. Instinct makes him reach out and take Sean's hand, talk to him in a low and soothing tone. Nick sits there, leaning forward, holding Sean's hand in a firm grasp and talking to him. He's never done that before. And Sean doesn't try to pull away, he lets them put the mask on him, his breathing calms a little. Nick holds on, his thumb gently stroking the back of Sean's hand.

 

The wound in Sean's side isn't especially bad, or complicated, but they have to knock him out to get the bullet out and there is no mistaking it, Sean is terrified. Nick stays with him until the drugs pull him under, promising that he will be there when the Captain wakes up. Something that annoys the doctor and the nurses, but Nick has managed to keep Sean calm and they can see the benefit of that. So Nick sits and waits, and when they wheel Sean back into the room they have allocated, Nick is ushered in to sit beside him.

When Sean wakes, he's groggy and still frightened, even though he's trying so very, very hard not to show it, and something in Nick makes him reach out to take Sean's hand in his again, to hold it and promise Sean that he's safe...

From what, is what is bothering Nick as Sean falls back to sleep, half-turned towards the Grimm he is sure he hated.


	4. Dazed and Confused

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick stays by Sean's bedside, the zauberbiest has no idea why he's there, but he knows he has to get away from Nick. This treacherous feeling... well Nick is not for him, Sean knows that. The longer he leaves it, the more difficult it will be to break away, and Sean has to get out of there.

Every time Sean opens his eyes, the Grimm is there. The gentle hand that held his as Sean tossed and turned, in the grip of nightmares he couldn't shake... that was Nick's.

Weakened by the wound in his side, the damage surprisingly minimal, but still painful and it makes it really hard to concentrate. This feeling of completeness is too good. It makes Sean believe he can have what he has dreamed of in his weakest moments. Nick is not, cannot be for him.

So when the Grimm leaves to get cleaned up, Sean takes his chance. Peeling the covers back and sitting up very slowly is painful, but he does it. Summoning every ounce of authority and dignity he possesses, he tells the nurse and then the doctor he is signing out, and returning home. Against medical advice. Yes, he's well aware of that, but he needs not to be there. Although he doesn't tell them that. It's not as though his address isn't on his medical records.

Driving is going to be a bit of a bitch, but he figures he can manage it. He needs to get back to his other car, again registered in another identity, which is a bit of a risk, but better than having a taxi driver and a trail leading everyone straight to his bolt hole. Taxi to his home. Ignoring his Uber account, he calls another taxi company and organises them to drop him at a hotel that's only a few streets from his garage where he can pick up the station wagon. It's a few years old and relentlessly non-descript. By the time he's dropped at the hotel, and walked the few blocks to the car, he's more than ready to sit down.

He's very tired, and considerably weakened by the time he puts the car into park and climbs out of it. He still has to walk down the pontoon, and get on board, but he knows that there's food and supplies on there, and he can relax, hole up and heal for a while. He uses a burner phone, he has several, rings it in to the Chief. These days they are hardly on good terms, and Renard knows they are all now just itching to get rid of him, but getting rid of a man wounded on the job would look bad to the department so his job is relatively safe for now.

Only after all that does he slump down on his ready-made up bed, and give into the bone-deep tiredness and the nagging dull pain in his side.

Sean sleeps, but it isn't an easy sleep.

Something draws near, and this time it is coming for him.

 

Nick is officially worried. And says as much. He thought he was breaking through Sean's reserve, that finally after all this fighting, he had managed to break down Sean's terrible, defensive walls of resistance. That the zauberbiest, weakened, in pain, crawled out of his sickbed, signed himself out against medical advice, all because he was scared of Nick, well Nick doesn't know what to think.

And Sean hasn't gone home. Or if he did, he didn't actually enter the house. Which Nick can relate to. He's not sure if he would be keen to enter a house where the bath had held a dead body. One stolen from a morgue.

In fact, he wonders out loud to Hank, whether the body was just the final straw that pushed Renard not over the top, but entirely off the cliff. At the time, he was avoiding getting shot where he stood, and too blindly angry to think about it too much, but Sean Renard's actions following the Black Claw debacle, and then Hank and Wu arresting Sean for his girlfriend's murder seemed curiously out of character for the extremely reserved and dignified zauberbiest. Now Sean appears angry, all the time, there's a palpable tension in the air, and the cold, hard, dignified Captain seems a lot more volatile than he has ever appeared previously.

And now Nick can admit to himself he's worried for Sean. His deep down well-hidden feelings for his handsome, charismatic Captain he now acknowledges to himself. It's taken Sean's apparent disappearance, wounded, for Nick to look himself in the mirror and admit it. He has feelings for Sean.

He tells Adalind. Who actually rolls her eyes. "I know." She says.

Nick's evil genius prompts him to enquire how she could possibly know because he didn't know himself.

Adalind's eyes almost spin in her head they roll so hard. She mutters something about Grimm obtuseness. Which naturally Nick takes exception to, except everyone tells him he's obtuse, so he rather has to own that one. One opinion might be considered bias, a complete consensus... that's another matter.

None of this gets him closer to finding Sean.

 

Sean stays below decks for three days, his side is painful, he's tired, sick and there's this strange ache all over his body. He has food aplenty, and drinking water, so he curls up with his fruit, and drinks bottle after bottle of water. When he sleeps, he dreams. Strange dreams of a creature with wings. He feels too close to the creature to see what it is, just the huge black wings, powerful.... with wings like that, Sean could fly.

 

He wakes in the early hours of the morning. Glances blearily at his watch, tries to figure out how long he's slept. He moves to sit up, and something moves with him, Sean's hand stretches out to move the thing out of the way and his fingers encounter feathers... he can feel feathers, and the touch of something. He sits on his bunk and tries to process the glossy black wing, his fingers buried in the feathers.

Sean is smart and educated and a part of the Wesen world, he's the son of an immensely powerful hexenbiest burgeoning with ambition even now. Literally nothing should phase him in anyway. He had surely seen it all before.

But he sits there on the bed, the fingers of his left hand buried deep in his feathers, the ache in his side unnoticed as he tries to process the fact that he has wings, and apparently his mother never bothered to tell him.


	5. Flight Path

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick needs to think. But in his messed up life, when does he get time.
> 
> He runs into Sean. It doesn't go quite according to plan.

Nick needed to think. And think hard about what he really wanted. It wasn't fair to Adalind, to be cuddled up to her and still feel someone else at the back of his mind.  
The time he took on Sean's form to keep himself from being murdered and to take down the zauberbiest, well, he'd ignored it at the time, but being Renard had given him an insight into Sean's hard and lonely life, and through it all he had to fight the feelings of loss which seemed to really colour all that Renard said and did.  
However much of a manipulative and ambitious shit the man appeared on the surface, underneath were feelings of profound loss and a sense of helplessness that Nick would never have suspected, or known about, had he not inhabited Sean's body.

Now that he had apparently chased Sean out of his house, and the zauberbiest was holed up _fuck knows where_ Nick started to pick up on other information his mind had absorbed in the approximately eight hours he had been Sean Renard. And it really wasn't a pretty picture. It was just a long jumbled snapshot at first, but Nick's mind was starting to unravel things he wished he didn't know. Sean's early childhood, filled with sly violence, that his very ambitious mother preferred to pretend was not happening, which culminated in Sean falling down the castle stairs when he was four. It was a broken arm that time, but the abuse continued, while Eric's nanny covered it up. Aged nine, Sean had tried to run away.

Nick slammed the door shut on the ghost of that memory. He did not want to see that. To pity Sean Renard.

But he did want to know, to understand, and that's what was driving Nick crazier every day since he had woken up in Sean's bed, and the zauberbiest had done a flit from his home.

 

So Nick's driving, aimlessly, trying to figure it all out. And he pulls into the car park by the forest... And as if by magic he sees Renard's Tahoe there. It's like he's drawn to the damn thing by magic. He pulls up, inwardly cursing his luck while part of him is overjoyed to have found his zauberbiest. And since when had Sean Renard become HIS zauberbiest.

The Tahoe is haphazardly parked, which is when Nick realises two things, the back door on the driver's side is open, and there are bottles... empty bottles... beer bottles, just dropped by the open door. A quick glance inside reveals a case of beer, partially opened, and another empty box in the footwell and well, now Nick is officially worried, because there's an empty bottle of Maker's Mark on the floor, while Nick certain that Renard, who's big and very strong, and not exactly human ... and what exactly is a Royal, because when Nick thinks about it, from their behaviour alone, he doubts they're human... Nick doesn't doubt that Sean can hold his liquor, but that much liquor, despite his size and strength... and...

He swings round, Sean's behind him. And Nick's mouth opens and closes but no sound comes out because his round eyes are trying to process what's in front of him and just... _Dammit_!

Sean's naked to the waist, wearing sea-green sleep pants that ride quite low on his hips, showing the deep cut groves of his hips, the magnificent six-pack, and forgive Nick if he swallows just a little bit, and clears his throat a time or two, but he's never seen his Captain quite like this before, and whilst his eyes have been feasting on the surpassing gorgeousness of Sean Renard's body, his mind is stuck on the wings.

Wings.

Black, beautiful, iridescent wings. Sprouting from Sean's back. Impossible wings. Wings that simply shouldn't be there.

"Sean..." Nick swallows. Hard.

Sean shoots him a defiant glare, which comes off hurt and lost, and Nick just wants to surge forward, gather his zauberbiest into his arms and promise him the world if only he would let Nick in. And, damn, where the hell did that come from?

Sean stares at the cause of most of his most recent misery and thinks that fate, karma or whatever it is, surely is now just messing with him. Showing him the impossible. Sean tilts the bottle, there's still some liquid left, he knocks it back and drops the bottle where he stands.

Nick takes a step closer. His fingers make contact with Sean’s feathers. They’re soft and warm, and Nick can feel them quiver beneath his hand, he holds Sean’s eyes, worried that if he looks away even for a second that Sean’s going to pull back.

Sean stands there, swaying a little because he’s not exactly sober, and the source of his stress is right there in front of him, but the fingers stroking his wing feel so good, and it’s all twisted up in Sean’s head.

“NO!” Sean pulls back hard, spins round, a couple of flaps and he’s airborne.

Nick winces, the flight path is wobbly, and unstable, and he just knows this is not going to end well.

The winged zauberbiest crashes into a tree about fifteen feet up, for a nano second hangs there before gravity takes over and he tumbles down in a melee of wings, arms and legs before landing with a comedy thud.

Nick runs towards his downed biest, not certain what he’s going to find.

 

Rosalee lifts the tailgate of Sean’s Tahoe and chances a glance inside. She doesn’t need to see the pile of empty bottles in the footwell, her delicate nose can easily detect that Sean Renard smells a little like a brewery. What is phasing her brain is naturally the wings, he’s covered in cuts and bruises, slumped in a heap on his front, his wings, one’s folded normally, or it looks normal, the other is sagging out to the side, from the mess of blood on the feathers, and the distinctly crooked look to the wing, she suspects it’s broken.

Huge zauberbiest with a broken wing… huh! You don’t see that every day.

“What happened?” She means the wings, because this is new, but Nick interprets it as a question about the accident…

After five full minutes of waving arms and aborted half sentences, Rosalee decides that whatever happened, the wings, the apparent crash, Sean looks beat to hell, and apparently has a broken wing.

Rosalee to the rescue.

Nick drops the lower tailgate, and they haul him towards them. Sean doesn’t even flinch when his injured wing drops as they pull him upright.

He’s heavy. They knew that, but Rosalee’s knees are buckling until Monroe appears in the doorway.

“Help!” Rosalee squeaks as Renard’s weight, off centre, starts to fall forward. Monroe leaps forward, shoots a glance at Nick, “dude… what the…”

Nick would wave a hand if his arms were not full of drunken, comatose, injured zauberbiest. “I literally don’t know…” he pants, Sean’s heavy, especially with additional wings, “can we do this some other time!” he gasps.

 

They half-drag, half-carry Sean into the Spice Shop. Nick wincing in sympathy when the broken wing, from dragging on the ground, briefly gets stuck in the doorway, which rouses Sean just enough to moan in pain before passing out again.

Even with three people carrying him, he’s heavy, and drunk, and the wings just flop everywhere as now the undamaged one gets in on the act and just drops down. They stagger towards Rosalee’s love seat at the back of the shop, and the weight reaches a tipping point.

Nick falls heavily backwards, slumping down on the loveseat, Sean sprawled on top of him, wings dragging on the floor, head buried against Nick’s shoulder. Nick lies winded as Rosalee and Monroe, dishevelled, sort themselves out.

Sean rouses, huffs a little into the side of Nick’s neck, the Grimm glances down, warily, this is Sean Renard, but the zauberbiest’s grin is goofy, “s’nice…” Sean slurs, and passes out again.


	6. Headache

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Large, winged zauberbiester are miserable drunks. And the hangovers are epic. It probably isn't Grimm lore, but plying said drunken, hungover zauberbiest with cheesecake might work... or Nick decides what he needs to do is make up with Sean Renard. For the good of Diana, obviously.
> 
> But first they need to find a place to deposit his large drunk fairybiest...
> 
> Rosalee and Monroe think he's lying to himself.

Sean was heavy, mostly unmanageable, what with the wings flopping everywhere, and the rather hasty patch up job that Rosalee had managed on the broken one, and he was lying on top of Nick.

The Grimm tried to extract himself from the drunken Zauberbiest's mostly loose grasp, which resulted in some unintelligible muttering and a pair of arms clutching him to the naked chest (seriously, why was Renard half-naked and in sleep pants no less) to clamp around him like steel bands. The muttering Nick rather thought was in German, or possibly French, but definitely not English... He got a hand up to Sean's shoulder and squirmed hard, trying to pull himself free, which was when the undamaged wing got in on the act and wrapped itself firmly around Nick's body.

Suddenly Nick's world was a sea of feathers. There was more muttering, definitely German, and Nick was going to ask for a translation, but Monroe's expression went from amused to startled, and Nick decided the explanation could wait for after he'd extracted himself from his winged zauberbiest's fierce grip.

The shifting around stopped, and Nick relaxed, perhaps if he played dead, the zauberbiest would assume it's prey was really most sincerely deceased, and let go.

The aquiline nose nudged into his shoulder, and burrowed a bit, Rosalee and Monroe were looking rather knowing, and Nick blushed as something like a fumbling kiss branded itself into his collarbone, slurred muttering, and then....

Nick freed an arm and made a gesture which could be interpreted as _a little help, please_. Then he looked down, startled as Renard began to snore.

Monroe moved forward to help, as Nick slowly and with much difficulty extracted himself from Renard's very drunken clutches.

Nick scrambled up, stuffing the pillow that had been scrunched up underneath him into Renard's arms as he went, the pillow was clutched, more muttering and then the snoring changed key.

Rosalee burst into silent giggles as the three of them slunk away.

"What?" Nick glanced warily behind him, Sean was out for the count, occupying all of Rosalee's loveseat and over-flowing it.

She sobered a little. "He's not snoring, he's purring..." She shot a look at Nick's confused face, "he's trying to .... _romance_ you."

Nick glared. "He's drunk. He doesn't know what he's doing." He hated that he flushed pink at the idea. He loved Adalind, he had a baby boy and Diana... was Sean's... they were linked by Adalind and that was absolutely it.

Monroe was staring at the loveseat, and the wing-span and Nick knew he was doing calculations in his head... "Well, he really can't stay there, because..." Monroe made a gesture which encompassed the small space, and the number of breakable and glass objects within wing's reach. 

"What do you suggest we do?" Nick didn't mean to be sarcastic, but having gotten him this far, he was rather loathe to try and move his biest further.

And when the heck did he start thinking of Sean as his biest... or even calling him by his first name. His friends' knowing expressions he decided to ignore.

"We just have to move him." Said Monroe.

"And that worked out so well before." Nick scowled.

"We need more help, that's all..."

Nick thought about it and paled at the possible implications. So Renard was sort of his enemy, but Nick was trying to get on better terms with him, and he didn't really want to lose sight of that. It was all for Diana. Really, it was. And now Sean had wings, and being this drunk, okay, he wasn't on duty, but there were enough people that hated him, he could lose his job, and wings.... and Nick realised he was babbling.

 

Getting him back in the Tahoe, so that they could drive over to Monroe and Rosalee's so that they could deposit his drunken, winged ass, in the spare bed to sleep it off went startlingly smoothly. Nick kept expecting something to go wrong, but Renard pretty much went of his own accord, following Nick like some kind of _giant pet fairy_ as Monroe put it, and Nick spent the entire drive over to Monroe and Rosalee's trying to rid his brain of that mental image.

Getting him up the stairs and into the bed, without catching the wings in doorways, or knocking any of Monroe's beloved clocks off the walls as they went past proved relatively simple as Nick discovered he could make the wings fold in a bit simply by touching them. The broken one didn't work very well, but they managed to get his dozy drunken ass up to the bedroom, and simply let him face-plant across the bed.

Nick stumbled slowly down the stairs and flopped down on Monrosalee's couch.... and he had no idea where that came from but assumed that he was a little punchy from lack of sleep and the last four.... no five, hours.

Somewhere in the back of his overloaded brain, Nick thought _cheesecake_ before flopping over on his side. Someone covered him with a blanket, "cheesecake" he muttered "'s nice..."


End file.
